Send No Flowers - Hardcover

Setting: Contemporary
Sensuality Rating: 8

When an unexpected storm disrupts young widow Alicia Russell's camping trip with her two sons, she and the boys are rescued by a mysterious man who offers them shelter for the night. Alicia is reluctant to accept Pierce Reynolds's offer, but the ferocity of the storm and the resulting damage to her own cabin leave her little choice.

Pierce's attention to the boys wins their outright worship--and reminds Alicia how much her sons have missed having a man in their lives--while his sensuality rekindles emotions Alicia had thought were long buried. But as she gradually allows herself to explore her desires, Pierce seems determined to keep his distance emotionally for reasons he can't, or won't, explain.

Well written and sensual, this hardcover reissue of one of Brown's early entries in the Bantam Loveswept line holds up well given the time that has elapsed since its initial publication in the early 1980s. The plot device of enforced togetherness is somewhat tiresome, but longtime Brown fans looking for a hardcover edition of an old favorite might like to splurge on this one. --Lisa Wanttaja

One of the most beloved romance authors of all time, Sandra Brown creates love stories as defiantly passionate as they are richly emotional. Her "larger than life heroes and heroines make you believe all the warm, wonderful, wild things in life" (Rendezvous). Now the New York Times bestselling author of Tidings of Great Joy delivers an exquisitely sensual tale of a young woman's sudden, irresistible affair with a stranger--a man with a secret that could shatter her life.

Since the death of her husband, Alicia Russell has struggled to take care of her two young sons alone. Now fiercely independent, she is determined to never again depend on another person. But when a sudden storm threatens to ruin a family camping trip, Alicia finds it hard to say no to a stranger offering a night's refuge--especially when the man playing hero offers much more than shelter from the storm.

Handsome, sensual, and slightly mysterious, Pierce Reynolds showers much-needed attention on Alicia's sons--and reminds her, after so many years of solitude, how it feels to be desired. But even as he tempts her to explore her newly reawakened longings, he holds her at arm's length, his only explanation a silent refusal to share the secrets of his heart.

Torn by the fear that Pierce can't provide the emotional support she and her children deserve, Alicia returns to Los Angeles and struggles to move on without him. But when a crisis brings Pierce back into her life, Alicia knows she can't give him up again without a fight. Alicia has already learned that life comes with no guarantees. But can she convince the man who'd renewed her hope that love is a risk worth taking?

Tender, tantalizing, and never less than irresistible, Send No Flowers is one of Sandra Brown's classic romances, available in hardcover for the first time.